


A Dream Within His Nightmare

by LustOnMyFingers



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst, Confession, Consoling, Dragon dream, Dragonstone, F/M, Jon's Scars, Pre-Eastwatch, Premonition, Romance, Shared nightmare, Slight Canon Divergence, Smut, Troublesome dynamic of two stubborn rulers, prophetic dream
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-05-11
Packaged: 2019-05-05 05:33:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14610501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LustOnMyFingers/pseuds/LustOnMyFingers
Summary: The night before Jon leaves for Eastwatch, Daenerys wakes in a cold sweat from a prophetic dream in which she sees not only Jon, but the Night King. Without thinking, she wanders to his personal chamber in an attempt to wake him from the nightmare.





	A Dream Within His Nightmare

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DaenerysSnow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaenerysSnow/gifts).



> Happy belated birthday to DaenerysSnow! (I'm sorry this fic took so long but I tried my damndest to bring it to life in exactly the way I'd envisioned it. Hope you like it!)
> 
> The entirety of this fic came from her brilliant mint, I just happened to put words to it.
> 
> (Brought to you by Tool's "H", so much so that it might even be considered a 'songfic')

**_. . ._ **

**_|Daenerys|_ **

**. . .**

 

Before now, Daenerys could hardly imagine cold in any estimation beyond early morning frosts that faded as the day aged. It was the sort of cold she could enjoy, refreshing in her lungs and misting at her lips, all the while assured the sun would come to claim it—growing on the horizon and threatening the warmth of its fire. She had never known a true winter before now, and winter had, indeed, _come_.

 

 _No_ , this cold was different. It was all-encompassing, stretching out for miles—a wasteland of white and grey, stripping the land of all color, all life. The ice in the air sliced at her throat and lungs like tiny little daggers. Holding her breath made her feel warm, until that began to burn too, and she opened her airways back up to the blizzard for relief, finding none.

 

 _Nothing burns like the cold_.

 

Not even the flames she'd emerged from, unburnt and unscathed. The wind came first for her extremities, caressing her into a numb calm, a false siren's song of safety, a trap. The heat of Drogon's scales helped the cold from claiming her gloved fingers, and so it came for her nose and ears, instead. _Tyrion was right_ , she thought with certainty, yet the sentiment left another part of her mind perplexed. It was as if she was outside of her body, merely looking down on this tiny white figure clinging to the back of her onyx dragon, flying amidst the icy desert below.

 

_What had Tyrion said?_

 

 _Snow_ , her mind hazed, her thoughts shivering just like the rest of her. _Jon Snow?_ she wondered further, with the same godlike observance. Finally, in the distance she'd spotted an arrowhead, thanking the gods she didn't believe in that she'd somehow managed to find _it_. Her thoughts were a scattered mess of virulence and desperation, heightened as she watched what looked like an army of ants closing in on an iceberg.

 

It was him. It had to be.

 

 _Jon_.

 

Without so much as a _'Dracarys'_ , Drogon let out an earth-rattling wail, raining fire below all of his own volition. He had been worried for Jon, just as his mother had been. Rhaegal and Viserion followed his lead, and the ground erupted in flames, like orange paint spilling onto an empty canvas.

 

As the inferno dissipated, she finally glimpsed the true monster. The one the stubborn northerner had warned her about all along. A crown of spiked ice, insouciant eyes that burned an unearthly blue, almost like _stars_ , with all the presence of a king. He even held a scepter, one she could only liken to a giant icicle.

 

 _The Night King_.

 

An incubus, he was—his gaze apathetic as men froze to death before him, succumbing to madness as the cold burned from the outside in...

 

It was then she realized it was no scepter he'd held, but a _spear_. He drew his arm back to aim. _Jon_ , she thought again, shaking, this time because she knew he wasn't safe with this monster on the loose. When she met his ice-blue eyes, his gaze looked right past the small, silver-haired figure draped in white fur—and straight through to the omniscient phantom she'd resided within.

 

_He saw me._

 

Her mind had busted, becoming a broken dam of the man she'd come to save—his name, his eyes, voice, and smell—a deluge that infiltrated every last sense until she had to come up for air.

 

Gasping as she awoke, her body was slick with perspiration but icy to the touch. Her lungs no longer burned as she fought for breath. Daenerys clutched her chest, assessing that she had been in her own bed, safe and warm, _much too warm_. The air was humid, even; the sound of rain pattered just beyond the fused-stone walls. The pitch-darkness did nothing to soothe her nerves, her mind invariably wandering back to Jon, so much so that it felt like a physical pull against her body.

 

_And she would answer it._

 

Swiftly, she rose from her sweat-dampened coverings, slipping on only a simple silk robe. She headed out into the hallway, looking more like a frightened little girl than a queen.

 

Mumbling, " _Hash vo silat_ ," to her Dothraki guards— _do not follow—_ she then set off to find Jon. In truth, she hadn't known where his chamber was, exactly, but she followed the pull of him like a falling star answers the pull of the earth.

 

The door to his chamber was unguarded and unlocked. Without a second thought, she let herself inside. The room was likewise black as pitch, the chill alone enough to suggest he slept with the window open. The sound of rain trickled in, surely disguising her bare footfalls. She shivered in her thin silk shift, rubbing at the gooseflesh on her arms as she hesitantly approached. In the darkness, she could see the four posters of his bed, but not much beyond that. A flash of lightning illuminated the room all too briefly, and she saw him for only a split second, fighting against his coverings as he slept.

 

A crack of thunder came next, causing her to jump, but still, Jon hadn't stirred. Dany closed the rest of the distance quickly, sprinting to his bedside. From what she could tell in the darkness, his body had seized. Leaning in, she could see his pupils dancing wildly beneath his lids—trapped in a nightmare, just as she had been.

 

"Jon," she softly cried.

 

It wasn't enough to wake him. Certainly not against the racket of the storm.

 

" _Jon_ ," she called again, this time shaking his shoulder, his skin was strangely cold and clammy, just as hers had been... It was then she visually inspected his naked torso, spying a series of what she could only assume had been fatal wounds, wondering how in seven hells he'd managed to survive them.

 

Another flash of lightning revealed a deep scowl on his face, and that his skin was webbed with veins. She began to worry, now, wondering if somewhere behind his fluttering lids the Night King had haunted him, too. Dany boldly climbed atop his body, using all of her weight to rattle him awake. Thunder cracked once more, sending a misting of rain far enough to wet the skin of her arms.

 

Before she knew it, she was on her back below him in one swift motion, her arms pinned uncomfortably beneath her. Suddenly, his hand was at her throat, firmly holding her in place. The storm was right above them now, the lightning like white-hot netting across the sky, briefly revealing her identity to her attacker. Before the light faded, his eyes grew twice in size as he pieced together what he'd just done, and to _whom_.

 

 

**_. . ._ **

**_|Jon|_ **

**. . .**

 

He'd awoken from one dream, slipping straight into another. _Daenerys_. There she was below him, her face just inches from his, her hair, a flood of silver waves dominating his field of vision.

 

Though the moment he blinked, all he could see in his mind were two eyes like blue flames. He shuddered, loosening his grip on the woman beneath him, slowly coming to the conclusion she might actually be _real_ —as if he pulled her straight from his mind and into his bed.

 

After recovering her arms, she gently clasped either side of his face, "I didn't mean to frighten you. You were having a nightmare."

 

Her palms were so soft, they'd lulled his eyes back shut as she dragged them over his cheek, her voice dousing the last remnants of his imagined horrors.

 

He lifted himself off of her, careful to wrap a sheet around his lower half. It was then that he'd noticed her robe had barely clung to the tips of her breasts, thankfully taut enough to keep the silk from slipping away, entirely.

 

Before now, the most touching they'd done had been within the caves, under the protection of leather and wool. He remembered it all too well—the way he'd clasped her wrist, staring at her like a drunken fool. The hope he'd felt as she stepped toward him, and the disappointment that washed it all away as she restated her expectation of him— _Bend the knee_.

 

 _Would that I could, my queen_.

 

The man inside the king was already hers, _all hers_. With a slow gulp, he sunk back into his resolve, ever reluctant. _My people_ , he thought, as king and queen wordlessly gazed at one another, _they need me_.

 

Yet now he'd known the touch of her skin, her hair. Even better than his uncreative mind could've imagined, himself. Unable to help it, his gaze floated to her scarcely-clad form again, realizing how much he could see through the slight fabric.

 

 _Gods_.

 

"Why are you here?" he asked, _far_ too aggressively. He drew his knees to his chest, wrapping his arms around them, as defensive a pose as he could manage.

 

During daylight hours, in the company of others, and underneath several layers of armor, he could easily hide the way he felt—but half-naked in bed beside her had exposed his weaknesses. His entire body shook as if he'd actually pulled himself from the frozen lake in his nightmare. Even his hair was wet— _was it sweat?_ Or perhaps even the rain—the floor shone from window to bedside.

 

 _I need her to leave_.

 

Drawing her robe together in one fist, Daenerys ignored his inquiry, adjusting onto her knees. The silk clung to her body, exposing every soft curve those stiff, modest dresses had _thankfully_ concealed until now.

 

_Leave._

 

_Please leave._

 

Backlit against the window, the advantage of the moonlight was all hers—the queen's face obscured by darkness, while his was on full display. Impossibly soft fingertips found his face again, brushing his hair from his eyes, as if unmasking him. Even in the simple touch, he'd found a conflicting duality—both easing him into an unfamiliar serenity, and setting his entire body alight.

 

Jon closed his eyes. He simply listened to the low growl of the thunder, to the wind as it sprayed rain against the castle walls in uneven strokes. Still, Daenerys hadn't stirred.

 

 _She isn't leaving_.

 

"I had a nightmare, too," she finally confessed.

 

"I'm sorry," _Dany,_ he thought. "Your Grace," he said.

 

Suddenly, he was struck with the realization of what he'd just done to the queen, and the possible repercussions of his actions. His forehead wrinkled with shame.

 

"I was careless," he said. "I could've hurt you."

 

"But you didn't."

 

"I _shouldn't_ have touched you."

 

" _Jon_ ," the queen chuckled lightly. His name had slipped from her tongue with more ease than her usual formalities. "You were merely acting on instinct."

 

" _Still_ , I shoul-"

 

" _Don't_ ," she interrupted him. "I am neither hurt, nor offended."

 

Jon nodded, though he couldn't help his momentary lapse into disappointment in himself. Doing his best to shield his eyes from the queen, his mind began to wander. He quickly realized he shouldn't have even made the list of those apt to comfort her after a nightmare—that she'd had thousands of loyal subjects all throughout the castle and island who would've been more suited for the task.

 

"Why did you come? To _me_ , I mean."

 

Daenerys did not answer. She only rubbed her arms for friction, for warmth.

 

Without a moment's hesitation, Jon shifted back onto his knees, drawing his sheet around her shoulders. A break in the clouds revealed a dull crescent moon, enough to lure his form from the darkness—seven unmistakable scars, almost like a map to his most vital organs. There's no way he should've survived one, let alone six beyond it.

 

Though her eyes widened enough to hint her curiosity, Daenerys quickly adjusted, slipping back under her veil of placidity.

 

"I came because I dreamed of you."

 

_I dreamed of you, too._

 

Daenerys sighed, pulling the sheet tightly over her arms. "What is it you saw, Jon?" she hesitantly asked. "When I woke you?"

 

_I was drowning._

 

"It's... hard to remember, exactly."

 

"You were north of the Wall," she guessed.

 

"Aye."

 

"Was I there?"

 

Reluctantly, he nodded.

 

"And the army of the dead?"

 

Licking his lips, he nodded again. "They were closing in on us when-"

 

"I came with my dragons."

 

Jon's mouth hung ajar. How could she have known such detail?

 

"You were right," she quickly said, shaking her head as if in disbelief. "You were right _all along_."

 

"What d'you mean?"

 

"The Night King. I saw him."

 

"You _saw_ the Night King? How?"

 

"In our dream," she whispered.

 

 _Our dream_ , he considered. It's true he'd seen her there, that her presence felt eerily tangible.

 

"What else did you see?" he asked, reluctant. She mustn't have seen it all, she was far too calm. Even her queenly mask wouldn't have been enough to hide her devastation had she seen what he'd caused...

 

Her dragon. _Her son_.

 

"This is going to sound strange, _but_ ," she hesitated. "I think he saw me, too."

 

"You mean the Night King?" he couldn't help but growl the monster's name.

 

"When he looked at me I woke up. It was like _he_ woke me up."

 

Jon balled his fists so hard his knuckles began to crack. Whether or not it had all been a dream—or a _nightmare—_ he felt himself slipping into a blind rage. The mere thought of the Night King so much as glancing at the queen made his blood boil. Daenerys hadn't taken the silence well, he could tell—yet he couldn't bring himself to pry apart his gritted jaw.

 

"I ought to leave."

 

_No._

 

The sheet slipped from her shoulders, and she pushed it aside. Swiftly, she swung her legs over the bedside and before Jon knew it, Daenerys was on her feet and smoothing out her robe, hesitating.

 

 _I need her to stay_.

 

With much abandon, Jon crawled toward her and caught hold of her wrist. If she wanted to, she could have him burned alive for taking such a liberty.

 

"Don't go," he pleaded.

 

But she hadn't pulled away, nor had she scolded him. She simply stood there, without so much as reacting to the bold move.

 

_Don't leave._

 

_Please don't leave._

 

"I'll stay," she said, meekly, as Jon held his breath. "Under one condition."

 

"Anything."

 

He knew exactly what was coming next, and this time he didn't care.

 

 _She isn't leaving_.

 

"While it's true that Ser Davos gets carried away, as you say, the knife you took to the heart was no mere _flight of fancy_."

 

"No. It wasn't," he quickly admitted. There was no use hiding it any longer.

 

"What happened to you, Jon? How did you survive it?" Even in the borrowed moonlight, he could see her chin quivering, the same way it had when he announced he'd be joining the mission to Eastwatch.

 

Jon slumped back onto the bed, unsure how or where to begin. Daenerys eyed him as he hesitated, drawing her brows together with concern.

 

"Would it make it easier if I divulged something to you, first?"

 

He nodded.

 

"You choose, my lord. What would you like to know?"

 

Several of her words had haunted him since their first meeting— _sold like a broodmare, chained, raped, defiled_. He could ask about any of those things, perhaps, but happening upon a queen clad in little more than a silk shift... it was best not to wade into dark, unfriendly waters, considering.

 

Flipping through her many titles like pages in a book, his mind settled on _The Unburnt_. After all, the many others he'd either been familiar with or able to deduce on his own—from Khaleesi of the Great Grass Sea to Breaker of Chains—for even at the Wall, he'd received word of the queen's refusal to leave Slaver's Bay until the freedom of former slaves had been secure. The Unburnt moniker had felt different to the others, more... _mysterious_.

 

"Why do they call you The Unburnt?"

 

The smirk that followed his inquiry had proven contagious as she sauntered the short distance to his bedside.

 

Jon quickly arranged his pillows like cushions against the headboard. After pulling himself against the makeshift seat, he patted the empty space beside him in invitation.

 

Though he'd left a generous amount of space for Daenerys, when she climbed atop, she nestled in right beside him—so much so that he could feel the bumpy texture of her horripilated skin as their arms brushed together. His eyes fell closed as the air trickled from his lungs like a slow leak.

 

"I'm afraid you won't believe a word of it. It's a strange tale."

 

"Stranger than blathering on about an army of dead men minutes into a first meeting?"

 

Daenerys smiled. A full, bright smile that completely transformed her face, stripping away years of neglect and abuse at the hands of others.

 

"That's fair," she said, careful to dial back her expression as she met his eyes.

 

Jon's swallowed, likewise wiping his face clean of its smile. He held eye contact as long as he could stand it. Swollen and pulsing, his veins ached with each palpitation in his chest.

 

"I'll believe you," he insisted.

 

She sighed, showing the same hesitation he had mere moments ago. Finally, she began, "I had taken mercy on a woman I shouldn't have. I saved her life and in return, the witch took the life of my husband and my child."

 

Jon fought the urge to offer condolences.

 

"The dragon eggs I'd received for my wedding were placed in the pyre built for the Khal. The offending woman was tied to the kindling. She began chanting something—perhaps a prayer or a ward. Though, neither worked."

 

Daenerys looked ahead as she finished her tale, "That night I walked into the flames in front of what remained of the khalasar. In the morning I rose from the embers and smoke, naked as my nameday, save for ash and soot. In my arms, I held three baby dragons."

 

Though the tale might've seemed unbelievable had it featured anyone else, he could almost see it vividly in his mind's eye, wishing he could've witnessed the spectacle, firsthand.

 

"What was it like?" he asked in a whisper.

 

"I put my hands in the fire, but I couldn't feel the flames. I felt the fabric of my dress ripple as it burned, and the thinness of the air had left me a bit disoriented..."

 

"Wow," he breathed, unsure what else to say. Though he knew Daenerys had a list of achievements that stretched further than the list of a dozen men combined—he wouldn't have guessed _godlike shows of power_ to be among them.

 

Suddenly, it struck him that their arms had still been touching, he reluctantly broke away.

 

Almost immediately, her skin had reclaimed the hot, clammy part of his arm as she nestled into the pillows beside him. Following her lead, Jon settled further, careful not to touch anything beyond the exposed skin on her arms. Unable to help himself, his eyes drifted down and over her body, so entranced by her form that he hadn't noticed her gaze likewise hanging on his mouth, agape at the sight of her.

 

Jon cleared his throat, peeling his eyes from her with a significant degree of difficulty.

 

"Ser Davos speaks as if you're the greatest swordsman to ever walk the north."

 

Jon grimaced. He'd never liked that sort of praise. "That man can't help runnin' his mouth, can he?"

 

"He's quite charming, once you get used to his blunt edges."

 

"How much charmin' does he do to you, exactly?"

 

"He's got to keep himself busy, somehow, hasn't he? With his king wandering the cliffside alone, endlessly staring out to sea."

 

When Jon offered no comment in response, Daenerys lifted herself up enough to discern his expression, narrowing her eyes as she studied it. "Do you want to leave here so badly?"

 

Turning away from her, he lied, "I don't know what I want."

 

_I want you._

 

" _Well_ ," she began, cutting through the silence like a knife, "What I want is to hear how the greatest swordsman in the north, perhaps in _all the realm—_ happened to receive multiple mortal wounds."

 

"Because that swordsman happened to be without his sword at the time," he admitted. "And even then, it might not have helped him."

 

Two large violet eyes peered up at him, illuminated by the yellowing of the storm-riddled sky, expectant and waiting for further detail.

 

"A boy of the Night's Watch lured me outside, where a small group of men stood, waiting to... _end my watch_."

 

"Ser Davos said you took a knife in the heart for your _people_ ," she said as a confused crease formed between her brows.

 

"Helpin' those north of the Wall get south of it, to escape the things you saw in... _our_ dream," he explained. "The few who disagreed with the decision to help our enemies were the ones who led the mutiny."

 

"The ones you rescued—did they not swear fealty to you?"

 

"Sometimes that sort of thing isn't enough to quash centuries-old enmities."

 

Daenerys nodded before dropping her head and resting it on his shoulder. Her hair, cool to the touch, and even softer than the silk she wore. As she nuzzled the tip of her cold nose into him—he could measure just how shallow each of her breaths had been.

 

As each sensation bled into the next, he was lulled from reality, altogether—the scent of her hair, her rhythmic respiring, the distant rumbling of the thunder. His mind feverishly worked to etch it all to memory, as he sneaked another peek of the body spread out before him—the way the silk creased and wrinkled in the hollow of her waist, the way it pulled smooth over the curve of her hip.

 

Jon felt a stirring between their bodies as Daenerys lifted her hand, her fingertips hesitant as they hovered above his still-healing wounds. It was no accident that when he twisted his body to adjust, he closed the rest of the distance between his abdomen and her hand. Though the scar tissue had dulled his nerves to some extent, she felt hot to the touch—dipping her fingers into his skin as she dragged the length of her palm over the small collection of scars just below his ribs.

 

Everything about it made him ache. The phantom memory of how he'd gotten his wounds, the indifferent darkness he'd faded into afterward. The realization that all of it was exposed to his queen as she mercilessly explored him, with both eyes and hands—like flint and tinder, sending sparks into the air around them and igniting something long-since dormant.

 

He held his breath as she smoothed her palm upward, over his ribs and toward his heart, hoping to divert his blood flow, already feeling it heading to all the wrong places. Instead, he focused on the pain, the unwelcome memory—clenching his eyes and balling his fist mere inches from her back to keep himself from mapping the topography of her figure—to keep his hands from falling into the same voids his gaze had.

 

"Do they hurt you, still?"

 

"No."

 

"You look like you're in pain."

 

_It's not the scars._

 

"How did you manage to survive? Not one," she said after several wordless moments, her eyes quickly dragging over his body to get the count correct, "but _seven?_ "

 

"I didn't," he simply said, as if there had been anything simple about it.

 

Expressionless, she gazed at him, though the shine in her eyes gave something away—though he wasn't bold enough to guess exactly _what_. When he refrained from expounding his experience any further, she licked her lips, "So you did give your life for your people, like Ser Davos implied?"

 

"That's his interpretation. I didn't know that I'd be givin' anything up."

 

"You were resuscitated?"

 

"Not exactly. I was long gone until a red priestess brought me back."

 

"How?"

 

"I don't know," he admitted with a slight smirk. "I wasn't there, after all. All I did was wake up."

 

"You've got a good heart, Jon Snow," she determined, echoing his sentiment of her just weeks ago. Tracing the crescent-shaped scar over his heart, she added, "Even the gods know it."

 

She swirled her fingertips lightly over the scar tissue as if stirring honeyed milk. He began slipping away, as if he'd been bled dry and drained of blood again—this time fading not into darkness, but _light_.

 

"Jon," she said, her soft voice pulling him back into his body.

 

He blinked his eyes open before facing her.

 

"The men who betrayed you—you said they sought to _'end your watch'_. Is this another northern _figure of speech?_ "

 

"In a way, I suppose," he rasped, still coming down from his high. "It has to do with our vows."

 

"Your vows?"

 

Lending her merely a hint of a smile, he found the words engraved perfectly in his mind alongside the cherished memories of his father, his fallen brothers—both kin and _Crow_.

 

"Hear my words and bear witness to my vow," he began his chant, free of any inflection, just as he'd done alongside Sam before the weirwood. "Night gathers and now my watch begins. It shall not end until my death."

 

"I shall take no wife," he paused long enough to painfully swallow the lump in his throat. "Hold no lands, father no children." As he continued, he noted that this time, it was Daenerys to gulp.

 

"I shall wear no crowns and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post."

 

Almost imperceptibly, she flinched.

 

"I am the sword in the darkness, I am the watcher on the walls. I am the shield that guards the realms of men, " he continued his chant as her gaze dragged from his eyes to his lips, and back again. "I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come."

 

Daenerys pressed her hand into his chest possessively as he finished, undoubtedly met with the thrumming of his heart against her palm. Furrowing her brow almost in disappointment, she silently considered his words, his vow.

 

"You swore an oath to wear no crowns, and yet you are a king," she'd observed, her voice having dropped significantly in pitch, taking on an almost seductive quality.

 

As Jon nodded, he closed his eyes. His vision blurred with the black, icy depths as reanimated dead men descended to their second deaths all around him, doomed and helpless. Jon, perhaps, no different from them at all. It was the fate that awaited him, he knew. This was his last chance to be _alive_.

 

He opened his eyes to a familiar gaze—an exact mirror of his own—swimming with undeniable desire, no longer obscured by a requisite impassivity. It had taken all that time to realize that tonight, she hadn't come to him as a queen. An identity almost impossible for her to shed, and yet she lie next to him—unbound and unburdened.

 

"You do not honor _every_ vow, then?"

 

In what should've been an accusatory tone, he'd found only hope, temptation.

 

_It's worth the risk._

 

After sliding down to her level, Jon raised a hand to her face. Carefully, he brushed her jawline with his fingernails until they'd nested in that unearthly silver mane—free of her usual braids and loose between his fingers. All at once the fortress he'd so carefully constructed had come crashing down all around him, leaving everything inside open and exposed.

 

"My watch has _ended_ ," he breathlessly assured her, as he pulled her into his kiss. Her lips—somehow both poison and its antidote.

 

Pliable in his hands, her body put up zero resistance as they began to wander. Likewise, she twisted under his touch, helping him to find the slope of her breasts, the curve of her bottom, as she tirelessly worked to map him all the same.

 

 _By the gods, I'll take her tonight,_ he vowed. Even his fear of leaving a bastard inside her womb gave him little pause. Tonight would be the last he might ever feel warmth, let alone a woman's touch—a queen's touch. _Daenerys_.

 

He kissed her like she were his last earthly meal—and she matched both his desperation and vigor in a clumsy clash of teeth and tongues.

 

Reluctantly, he broke away from her mouth as she struggled for breath, his teeth and gums almost aching to sink into her skin. Daenerys writhed as he nipped at her neck, licking the salt from her as gooseflesh sprouted all along her arms.

 

Hooking a leg around him, she drew him closer and teased the inside of his thigh with her bare foot. Like second nature, Jon began moving against the heat between her legs, despite the chafing of his rough breeches. Between grunts, he gnawed at her collarbone, grabbing handfuls of flesh all along her sides. Sharp nails incised his back, neck, and scalp as his mouth scraped its way south, parting the fabric of her robe until he'd reached the tie.

 

The silk clung lazily to her breasts as he unknotted the strings holding the piece together. Daenerys lie still as his hands slipped under the fabric and over her ribs, her chest rising with each deep, nervous breath as she waited for the final reveal. With little effort, the silk pooled to either side of her body, her pale skin almost luminescent against the darkness.

 

Jon placed a hand to either side of her ribcage, slowly dragging his palms over her body as she squirmed under his touch—his hands following the soft, concave chasm of her abdomen as she arced, twisting her body to guide them wherever she wanted. Inevitably, he'd reached the neatly-trimmed nest of hair mere inches from his groin—already, he could tell that she was slick and swollen. After licking his lips, he froze, riddled with a sudden apprehension. As he senselessly gawked, Daenerys sat up, slipping from her robe completely. Before he knew it, she'd already untied his breeches and began tugging them loose.

 

Adjusting to her knees, she nudged her robe clean off the side of his bed and right onto the rain-soaked tiles. A pair of small, warm hands smoothed over his skin from abdomen to chest, eyeing him hungrily, scars and all. Jon's breath became uneven as she gripped his hips before dipping down and placing a kiss to the scar at his hip's furrow. Her lips and nose brushed, light as feathers, as she made her way up to his ribs, placing soft kisses over each ridge of scarred flesh, paying extra care to kiss the curved wound at his heart.

 

Daenerys placed her forehead against his skin, dragging it over the panes of his chest as he pulled her into an embrace—her body pressed against his, pillowy soft and supple. Before long, her lips were on the move again, taking tastes from his collarbone and neck as her fingertips lightly traced over the claw marks she'd left all along his back.

 

After unburying herself from his neck, her tongue traveled over his jaw before finding his mouth again—her kiss oppressive and thorough, leaving him lightheaded and struggling for breath as her hands traveled further south, teasing the waistband of his breeches.

 

Breaking from her mouth the moment her hands slipped inside, he retreated into the hollow of her neck, already overwhelmed. She pinched and squeezed his backside, crudely groping at him by the handful, groaning in satisfaction at every muffled whimper she'd managed to coax from him.

 

Before he knew it, her right hand had slipped around to the front, her touch burning him like a flame as she palmed his shaft. Every part of his body constricted at once, instinctively thrusting against her. She tightened her grip on his back as his body rocked and shuddered against hers.

 

After getting ahold of himself, he slid a hand down her side and over her abdomen, aching to inspect her arousal more directly. Though the downy hair at her pelvis had been enough to disarm him, alone—he whimpered like a starved pup as his fingers slipped between her lips—velutinous, like a flower's petals or folded silks, and dipped in honey.

 

"I've dreamed of this night, Jon," she scalded his neck with a whisper almost as hot as her cunt as she rocked against him, nearly coating his whole hand in her. "It can't wait any longer."

 

The comment was enough to rob him of whatever breath he'd had left as she guided him onto his back, pushing him against his pillows with a kiss. She hovered above him, naked from head to toe, save for a veil of silver waves that jostled side to side, ticking his stomach and thighs as she worked his breeches straight from his hips and over his legs.

 

She mounted him, then, instantly engulfing him in her viscous wetness. A small hand slipped between her thighs, taking him in her palm. Softly, she stroked him—feather-light touches with her fingertips. Lifting herself up to accommodate his length, her eyes fell closed as she took him inside of her, inch by sweltry inch.

 

Daenerys sat astride him, biting at her lips. Blindly, she felt around for his hands. Fingers interlocked, she brought them to her hips, encouraging him to grab on. The moment she opened her eyes again, her desirous gaze shot him through like an arrow and hooked him in. Holding his hands firmly against her, she began rocking back and forth, setting alight a small flame that spread through his entire body like wildfire.

 

He admired each of her body's movements—thighs flexing, hips rolling and swaying, making sure they'd felt one another from every conceivable angle. Face flushed from her efforts, beads of sweat began rolling down her body, pooling in her navel.

 

After sitting up, Jon sunk his teeth into the fleshy underside of her breast before kissing his way over sweat-streaked skin up to her nipple. She sighed as he dragged his teeth over one after the other, until the skin pulled itself taut. He burrowed between her breasts, the rhythm of her heartbeat lulling him into a false sense of isolation all their own, safe from the poison that seeped from their respective crowns.

 

" _Jon_ ," she cried, twisting her fingers through his loose curls.

 

He gripped her thighs—the very thighs that clung to dragonback with seeming ease, tightly-drawn and straddling his lap. Clawing his way back up to her hips, he encouraged her to take him deeper, matching each movement with his own invasive thrusts, each groan he'd earned from her lips its own small glory.

 

The cool air struck his face like a backhanded slap as she tugged him away from the warm hollow between her breasts. No terrestrial temptation could compete with the violet gaze that fell upon him, then, with all the weight of two anchors, and the depth of a black and bottomless sea. He waded right in—so far in he'd willingly drown in it so long as it could be the last thing he'd ever see. Her lips brushed over his face, from chin to nose—neither her gaze nor her movements relenting as his body seized beneath her.

 

" _Dany_ ," he hissed her name as if it were the last word he'd ever utter. She continued her unmerciful assault until she'd finished him, shuddering along with each small eruption as he jerked inside of her, carelessly emptying every last drop of his seed.

 

Jon clasped around her like a snake strangling its prey, afraid that if he were to let go she might fade away—just as she'd done every night she'd manifested in his mind as he slept, or as he toiled away in the mines day after day. Tonight was different, though—the heat of her body burned him up, her hair adhered to his neck and shoulders, the smell of sweat and storm hung in the air. Tonight was _real_.

 

Daenerys peeled herself from him carefully, sighing at the relief of the cool air against her flushed skin. Unable to help himself, he kissed every inch of pale skin within reach of his lips, craning his neck even further to cover more terrain as he cradled her in his lap, still safely sheathed inside.

 

"The storm's passing," she whispered, lazily twirling his hair around her finger.

 

The yellowed sky was deceptive, with obvious bands of twilight along its edges—as if night were peddling wares of a false dawn.

 

"Lie down with me," he begged, lifting her with a twist, and lightly setting her in the center of his bed. Reluctantly, he withdrew from the haven she'd harbored between her legs.

 

He gazed down at her as she rearranged herself into a comfortable position. Crowning her, silver hair shone like the bow of a glory's light, the breadth of her body radiant and teasing the divinity within— _The Unburnt_. Flames were no match for her, nor would Jon be.

 

"You dreamed of this night before?" His voice cracked as he swallowed the hard lump in his throat, which hadn't budged an inch.

 

Even in the dull light, he could tell her cheeks flushed darker. Coyly, she bit her lip, "Many times."

 

It was Jon's turn to don a pair of flushed cheeks as he searched his mind for the right combination of words with which to barter for more details.

 

Yet she gave them all on her own, offering an intimate glimpse into her past. "Ever since I was a girl sailing the Summer Sea," she began, "I dreamed of a lover whose identity I never knew—his face always obscured with shadows. After you'd arrived, the shadows slowly fell away. And there you were—it was your face I'd been searching for all along."

 

The lump in his throat had grown twice in size, robbing him of the ability to speak.

 

"I've been waiting for you," her smile stretched the width of her face, her tired lids struggling to stay aloft. "I'm no ordinary woman, _Jon Snow_..."

 

_You're certainly not._

 

"My dreams come _true_ ," she insisted in a sleepy haze.

 

He didn't have long to bask in the sentiment before his mind slipped back to the bed of ice and the dead men who'd sent him crashing straight through it.

 

Perhaps it wasn't too late to change her fate, if not his.

 

"Dany," he nudged her back alert. "No matter how much you worry about the mission, or what you hear, promise me you will _stay_ at Dragonstone."

 

"Why?"

 

"Do you trust me, Dany?"

 

"I do."

 

"Do not fly north," he commanded her. "Promise me you won't."

 

After searching his eyes, she'd found something inside that warped her expression into one of distress, mirroring his exactly. "Jon," she began to protest.

 

" _Promise me_ , Dany," he interrupted, hoping the intensity of his stare would be enough to convey how seriously he'd meant it.

 

She placed a small hand to his heart, measuring each swift beat against his ribs. After a moment she met his eyes with a nod. "I promise," she finally whispered with averted eyes, barely enunciating the words.

 

Jon placed a kiss to her forehead before pulling a sheet over their bodies. Propped up on his elbow, he watched her drift to sleep beside him. It was his last night to truly live, and he'd milk it for every last drop.

 

He knew what was coming for him. She'd said it herself— _her dreams come true_.

 

An icy death awaited.

 

But tonight, in the queen's arms, he'd lived more than he had in all his twenty-two years—more than most men who'd trodden the same blood-soaked earth could hope to. He knew the cost of living, and it wasn't worth even an ounce of her pain.

 

 _It's alright_ , he thought.

 

_I don't mind._

**Author's Note:**

> It appears a bit of an addendum is in order! :D Allow me to address a few things here before you have at me in the comments:
> 
> Even though Jon recklessly ignored his inhibitions, it didn't change his priorities regarding the Night King or what's kickin' around beyond the Wall. His plea for Daenerys not to fly north has *nothing* to do with strategy, logic, or the success of his pending mission - and everything to do with his desperation and love for her. Again, this is a man who was woken from a perturbing nightmare by a barely-dressed woman he's had the hots for for a while... he's thinking with his other head, guys :D And while I agree they should've maybe used the time to strategize, that's not the fic I was looking to write, lol ;D 
> 
> What I wanted to write was a raw, emotional experience with a somber, hopeless tone. Lastly, the implication here is that the mission will be a success at the "cost of his life" (so far as he knows), and that Daenerys ignores his plea and everything unfolds just as it did in canon. I wasn't looking to change much in that regard.
> 
> Lastly - I did put a great deal of care into the Dothraki translation, nevertheless, I'm sure it's not exactly right. I tried! xD


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